So after that deluge of posts around Christmas time, I burned myself out on music and the blog for a spell. Now that I'm fully recharged, it's about time I shared with you some links to some new(it) tunes! I haven't really recommended anything since November so I barely even know where to start. Hopefully at least one of these will strike your fancy.
10 - "Happiness", Chris Malinchak feat. MNEK
OK, let's get it started with the latest Deep House beats from Chris Malinchak. This guy has been putting out some really smooth music for a couple of years now - "If You Got It" was one of my favourite 100 songs of 2012 and "So Good to Me" was almost in my top 40 for 2013. Apparently, this was a massive hit in the U.K., where it was only held out of the #1 spot on the charts by "Get Lucky". Impressive.
9 - "One Touch", Baauer feat. AlunaGeorge and Rae Sremmurd
So this is not the typical type of song that I get into. The vocals are a bit manic and I've never been into beating anything to put it on crutches, but that bass line...wow. I wasn't sure if Baauer would ever resurface after "Harlem Shake" and technically, until this actually turns into a hit, I suppose he hasn't. And hey, I learned what a Senzu bean was.
8 - "Work Song", Hozier
Was this really supposed to evoke images from 12 Years a Slave (somebody posted a video on YouTube with Hozier's audio played over clips from the film)? It's funny - "Take Me to Church" introduced me to Hozier, but I never totally fell in love with the song. A number of other tracks from his album are pretty strong, though, including this one. After almost winning The Grammys with Annie Lennox, I'm curious to see if he'll be more than just a blip on the map.
7 - "Please Don't", Leo Stannard
So this guy's pretty young. As far as I can tell, he's either 19 or 20. Apparently, his exposure on the Internet may have started around the time he covered alt-J's "Tessellate" for The Mahogany Sessions blog (if you're interested, you can see it here. It looks like he signed on with Black Butter records (Sony) just last week so maybe he'll be a little more "out there" in the coming months.
6 - "Giant in My Heart", Kiesza
This song was just on the fringe of my November list so it's already kind of run its course. "No Enemiesz" is getting a serious amount of spins around my house these days. But if you've somehow not heard "Giant" yet, it's definitely worth a listen. The single may or may not be hovering just outside the top 50 in Canada (it's a little hard to interpret Billboard's Canadian Hot 100 chart:( ) so it's definitely getting some run up here.
5 - "Artifice", SOHN
SOHN, otherwise known as Christopher Taylor, grew up in England but is now based in Vienna. Though he has been releasing tracks under the SOHN name for almost five years, "Artifice" is the lead single from just his first album (Tremors was released last April). His previous best-known track was probably "Bloodflows", also a really nice piece of music.
4 - "Lover", Chet Faker x SAINT WKND
Another young 'un. Apparently, SAINT WKND is a 20-year-old German producer (who went by just WKND until a couple of weeks ago...perhaps a bit too close to The Weeknd?) who has also just reworked some of M83's music. Interestingly, this is a cover of "You Don't Treat Me No Good", a song released by American soul group Sonia Dada in 1992. How did Chet Faker end up covering this song? It turns out that it topped the charts in Australia back in '92, knocking "I Will Always Love You" out of the pole position. In 2010, a cover went to #1 on the Hot Country Singles chart. That's a pretty rich history.
3 - "Silver", Caribou
I got to see Caribou opening for Radiohead in Montreal a few years ago and that was a real treat. I was particularly into "Sun" at the time and he played it...there's nothing better than hearing something that may or may not get played at a concert. In any case, I love me some Caribou...so much so that I'm slightly troubled that I only just found out that he has a PhD in Mathematics. AWESOME. This is the first track I heard from the latest album, Our Love. I will almost certainly be pimping another album track in the near future.
2 - "Help", Galantis
Swedish! Galantis is a duo of electronic musicians who have both had past hits with me (Miike Snow's "Animal" and "Paddling Out" and Style of Eye's "Wallpaper"). Late last year, Gallants threw a pile of tracks up on Soundcloud. This is the one that struck me the most - right in the vein of "Don't You Worry Child". Radio should be up on this, but it won't be. More for me.
1 - "Happy Idiot", TV on the Radio
And this month's winner is TVotR. Man, these guys have been around for a while. Looking at Wiki, it seems that the first song I remember hearing of their was actually their first (although there are gaps along the way): "Staring at the Sun". This song is amazing and I'm surprised that US Alternative radio has not run with it. The follow-up, "Careful You", is also pretty solid (and features some French!).
That's it for this time around...hopefully my next post won't take so long to put up.
